Unlikely Deposit
by DouglasDaleray
Summary: Calleigh, while waiting in line at Miami-Dade Federal to make a bank deposit, finds herself thrown into a totally different "deposit" and allows her to bring her newly found motherhood forth.


"Somebody, help us!" Calleigh heard as the young woman came screaming through the door of Miami-Dade Federal clutching her young daughter in her arms.

Calleigh turned around and saw both of them were covered in blood.

"Miami-Dade police," Calleigh said as she flashed her badge to the woman, "Ma'am, are you and your daughter hurt?"

"My husband, he's... he's ..." the woman said as she collapsed to the floor, "In the car!"

Calleigh yelled, "Someone call 9-1-1!" Then she pulled out her cell and hit one button. "Horatio, Miami-Dade Federal! Hurry!"

The woman's young daughter stood beside her mother lying on the bank's floor. Calleigh looked up at the young girl and observed her the best she could without giving away the mother had been stabbed, but she had a feeling the little girl already knew. The little girl looked at her and said, "Mommy and Daddy dead, aren't they?"

It broke Calleigh's heart and she thought of her own children at the moment, but did not know exactly how to answer this little girl. The mother had indeed died on the banks floor, but the little girl did not need to know that yet.

Calleigh acted like she was helping the mother and yelled, "Someone needs to go find the husband in the car!"

"Horatio is out there now Calleigh," Natalia said as the paramedics came rushing in and found Calleigh over the bloodied woman.

She eyed one of the medics and then the little girl and the medic got the message. Natalia caught the look also and said, "Sweetie, let's go over here and let the medics work on your mommy," and moved the little girl over to the tellers.

Calleigh stood up and joined them. She looked at Natalia as Natalia held on to the little girl.

Horatio walked in holding his sunglasses in his fingers. Calleigh made her way over to him. "Horatio, she was stabbed."

"Yeah, the husband still has the knife sticking out of his chest," Horatio answered.

Calleigh looked at the little girl still standing by Natalia, then back to Horatio and said, "Then we must find who made that deposit!"

* * *

"Anything yet Walter?"

Walter swiped his forehead as he came out from looking inside the passenger door then to Horatio. "H., this car is clean. Nothing but the family's prints. There is no sign of intrusion."

"Find me something Walter. Anything."

"I'm telling you H., there's nothing here. I've already been through it. It's not giving up anything."

"Then we better hope the knife gives us some answers."

"Delko has it now. Alex sent it up about an hour ago."

"Alex, Walter?

"That's what Delko said. I don't know where Tom is, but Delko seemed to know Alex."

Horatio smiled and said, "All of us know Alex. I'll have to check in with her. Thank you Walter."

Horatio made his way down to the morgue. When he stepped in, Alex was examining the body of the little girl's mother. The feeling of seeing an old friend warmed him.

Alex looked up and saw Horatio observing. She smiled and walked over to him. As she hugged him she said, "Just like you Horatio, quiet as a mouse sneaking up on someone."

"It's good to see you Alex. Where's Dr. Loman?"

"You didn't hear Horatio? He married that blonde in the picture he flashed everyone a couple of weeks ago. I'm filling in for him while he is on his honeymoon."

"Well, good for him. Alex, you look right at home," Horatio said with a smirk.

"It feels like home Horatio, but we both know I can't stay. I've moved on."

"I know Alex. I know. What have you found so far?"

"Both the husband and the wife were stabbed by the same knife. It was obvious the wife got it first then the husband. Whoever did this Horatio, would not have been able to pull the knife out of the husband then stab the wife. The knife's blade was wedged in between his ribs, but went deep enough to puncture the ventricle. He bled out in a matter of seconds."

"But yet, the wife's wound allowed her to be conscious enough to call for help, Alex."

"Enough until her liver gave out. The knife sunk in so far it went half way into her liver. It was only a matter of time. That's why she died on the floor of the bank, Horatio. And that poor little girl having to watch her mother die like that."

"It wasn't just her mother she watched Alex. It was her father also."

"For that little girl Horatio, get the son of a bitch that did this," Alex said.

"You can count on it, Alex. You have my word."

* * *

Calleigh waited outside the little girl's hospital room pacing back and forth thinking of her daughter and how it could be her in there. God only knew what the little girl was feeling.

Natalia and the doctor came out of the room and Calleigh stopped moving to look at them. She saw the look on Natalia's face. She knew that look.

"How is she doctor?" Calleigh asked anyway.

"Physically, she's fine. Mentally, she is disturbed," answered the doctor.

"She won't talk Calleigh. She hasn't said a word since she asked you what she did in the bank.," Natalia said and folded her arms as she looked through the window at the little girl sitting on the bed.

"She knows something. She's traumatized. She just saw her parents murdered. I'd clam up too. Maybe she will talk to me. We connected in the bank. Can I give it a shot doctor?"

"I don't see why not. It couldn't hurt. Go on in."

"I'll wait out here for you Calleigh," Natalia said.

Calleigh smiled and opened the door of the hospital room. The little girl was sitting on the bed with her legs dangling off the end of it. A nurse had helped her out of the bloody clothes that Natalia now held in an evidence bag. She knew she needed to get them back to the lab for processing, but she could not leave Calleigh and the little girl at the moment.

"Hi sweetie, remember me? My name's Calleigh. Can you tell me yours?"

The little girl looked at her expressionless.

"I love the shade of pink on your fingernails. I bet your mommy did that for you didn't she?"

Still nothing from the little girl. She just sat there; no emotions at all.

"And your hair. It's so pretty. It's the same color as my daughter's. She's just a bit older than you, but I would bet you and her would be quick friends," Calleigh tried again.

Still nothing. The little girl just continued to sit there looking at her.

Calleigh turned around to get the rolling stool that all doctors sat upon. As she turned her back, a tone of words came flowing out of the little girl.

"You're the police. You were in the bank helping my mommy."

Calleigh rolled to the little girl and said, "That's right sweetie. I was."

"Mommy dead now. Daddy too," said the little girl in her tiny voice.

"Yes sweetie, they are and I'm so very sorry. But we are going to work hard to catch who did that to them."

The little girl smiled and said, "Kayla."

Calleigh looked out the window to Natalia and Natalia knew she had something. She wasn't sure right yet what it was.

"Kayla? That's your name?" Calleigh asked.

"No, Kayla was in car with us. Babysitter. I'm Chelsea."

"Chelsea, where's Kayla now?"

"Don't know. She went with the man."

Chelsea turned her head and looked at Natalia. Natalia smiled and waved at her and she saw Calleigh pull out her phone.

"Horatio, we need to start looking for the babysitter."

* * *

A dark haired woman came running into the precinct and was being irate with the officer at the desk as Horatio hung up from hearing Calleigh tell him the news from the little girl. He walked over and said, "Officer," and shook his head at him, "Ma'am, Lieutenant Caine, can I help you?"

"My daughter, she's missing. I went to check my mail, and I found this note in my mailbox!" The frazzled woman spoke and handed the note to Horatio.

Horatio read it and asked, "What's your daughter's name?"

"Kayla," the woman spoke.

"Ma'am, come with me," Horatio said and escorted her to the interrogation room. On his way, he called Calleigh.

"Ms..." Asked Horatio as he shut the door of the room behind him.

"DeForest, Lieutenant."

"Ms. DeForest, tell me about Kayla. She was a babysitter wasn't she?"

Ms. DeForest looked at Horatio with an astonished look then spoke, "Why yes, she was. How do you already know that?"

"Because she was in the car with the Weiss family."

"Lieutenant, she babysits Chelsea for them. She spent the night with them because they were getting in really late and did not want her coming home at that hour. They were supposed to bring her home this morning, but she called me and said it would be this afternoon."

Calleigh then walked in.

"Ms. DeForest, this is CSI Duquesne. She was with Mrs. Weiss this morning as she died on the floor of Miami-Dade Federal."

"Died? Helen's dead? How? Robert, he's still..."

"No ma'am. Both of them were stabbed," Calleigh answered with a frown.

"Oh God! What about Chelsea? Was she...?"

"No ma'am, I've been at the hospital with her," Calleigh answered.

"Well that's good. Poor Chelsea. She didn't see them..." Ms. DeForest asked.

"Yes, she did, and she saw the person who took Kayla," Calleigh responded, knowing it was not the total truth, but at least half.

"Chelsea must be traumatized. But why take Kayla only and leave me with that note I found in my mailbox? Lieutenant, I don't have that kind of money. I don't understand?" Ms. DeForest said and shook her head.

"Neither do we ma'am. Neither do we, but we will find out." Horatio said and him and Calleigh walked out of the room.

Frank was standing in the hall when they exited the room. Horatio looked at him and said, "Frank, set up a kidnapping unit at Ms. DeForest's home and see that she gets home safely. Stay with her until the unit arrives. I'll be in touch."

"Will do Horatio."

Horatio and Calleigh walked down the hall as Frank entered and escorted Ms. DeForest out of the room.

Eric saw Calliegh and Horatio and hurried to the door to meet them. As soon as he exited, Horatio spoke.

"Whatcha got Eric?"

"A small hand print wrapped around the handle of the knife. It's too small to be a woman's or a man's. It's a childs."

Calleigh turned to Horatio and said, "Chelsea tried to save her father. I bet she tried to pull the knife out."

"Yes, and with the way Alex said it was wedged in, she couldn't budge it. Would not have done any good though."

"But Horatio, she didn't know that."

* * *

Horatio looked at Calleigh and said, "She does now."

"Is Chelsea in there Natalia?" Calleigh asked.

"Yeah, the child psychologist just went in. One of us should be in there you know."

"I agree Natalia, but we both know how this works. We'll just have to wait."

Then the door opened. The psychologist said, "She keeps asking for Calleigh. Who's she?"

"Me. Is there a problem?"

"Says she won't talk unless Calleigh is in the room. You know, we normally don't do that."

"Make an exception," Calleigh said and pushed by the psychologist into the room.

"Calleigh, she wants me to answer questions. I don't want too. I want to go home!" Chelsea said and began to cry.

"Chelsea, sweetie, I know you do, but you will have a new home soon."

"No new home. My home!" Chelsea yelled.

"Sweetie, we'll talk about that later. Right now though, can you do me a favor? This nice lady is gonna ask you some questions. And I want you to answer them the best you can. Will you do that for me?" Calleigh asked as if she was talking to her own daughter.

"Uh hum, I will Calleigh," Chelsea answered and smiled.

Calleigh smiled back to her and brushed Chelsea's hair.

The child psychologist began the questioning with simple ones and worked her way through harder ones. Calleigh sat there listening to Chelsea answer every one. One answer in particular was all Calleigh needed to hear.

When the questioning was done, Chelsea looked at Calleigh and asked, "Did good?"

Calleigh smiled, walked over to give Chelsea a hug and said, "You did well, sweetie. I'm proud of you. Come on!"

All of them walked out together and Natalia was still waiting outside the door. Calleigh and Chelsea met her as she smiled at Chelsea.

"Well, Calleigh, how did it go?"

"I need to call Horatio. The babysitter had a boyfriend."

"Oh, that could be trouble," Natalia said.

"Yeah, especially when mom does not know about him," Calleigh said.

"Oh, but Chelsea does? This does not look good, Calleigh."

Calleigh kneeled down to Chelsea and said, "Sweetie, I need you to go with Natalia now. She's going to take you to a room where you can play. I'll check on you later. I promise."

"Come on Chelsea. You and I are gonna have fun!" Natalia said as she took Chelsea's hand.

Calleigh had her phone up to her ear as Chelsea turned around and said, "Bye Calleigh."

"Bye sweetie," Horatio heard as he answered.

"Geez, I just said hello, darling," he said with a laugh.

"Very funny Horatio. Are you with Kayla's mother? Good, you need to ask her about Kayla's boyfriend... but Horatio, she doesn't know about him."

* * *

"You didn't know Kayla has a boyfriend did you Ms. DeForest?"

"Boyfriend? What boyfriend?"

"That's what we would like to know."

"Kayla would tell me if she had one, Lieutenant."

"Not if she didn't want you to find out about him."

"Lieutenant Caine, Kayla and I have no secrets. We tell each other everything."

Frank got up to move around. He had been sitting in Ms. Deforest's living room since he had escorted her home to wait for any call or notification from the kidnappers. Then he saw it.

"Horatio, you need to see this," Frank said and motioned to Horatio to come over.

Horatio walked over to where Frank was standing and Frank pointed.

"Frank, that cell phone does not belong to Ms. DeForest 'cause she has hers in her hand."

"Yeah, and this one's in a pink case. I do not know of a teenage girl going without her cell at all. My daughter's is glued to her hip," Frank said with a laugh.

"Frank, we need to search this house. Kayla's here," Horatio said and turned to face Ms. DeForest. He could tell by the look on her face that she knew she had been caught. Horatio had seen that look a hundred times.

"She's here isn't she, Ms. DeForest?"

"Lieutenant, I don't like what you are implying," she answered, trying to play it off.

"You know I just saw Kalya's cell phone on the table. We both know a teen girl is not without her cell phone."

As Horatio tried to get through to her, Frank and a couple officers searched the house. Frank went first to Kayla's room. Of course, it was typical of a teen girl. He looked around first then saw a tray with some unopened crackers and a sport bottle full of water by the closet door. He carefully crossed to the closet door, drew his gun before opening it, and turned the knob.

As Frank slowly opened the closet door, Kayla came into view, tied and gagged to a chair. Her hair was frazzled and she tried to scream through the duct tape covering her mouth. Frank saw in here eyes that she was scared to death. He flashed her his badge and said, "Kayla, everything is going to be alright. We got you now."

Frank reached in and pulled the chair out by its legs and pulled the duct tape off of Kayla's mouth first. Her mouth was almost raw from having the tape removed many times.

"My mom's crazy! You have to get me away from here!" Kayla said as Frank began cutting the rest of her loose.

"You don't have to convince me twice," Frank said and helped Kayla up.

Both of them walked into the living room. Kayla saw her mother sitting there nonchalantly like nothing ever happened and said, "I told you they would find me. I kept telling you what you did was insane. And you think you are protecting me? Who's gonna protect Chelsea now? You killed her parents, remember? Then took me. All in front of her! At least Mr. and Mrs. Weiss understood about Michael. Unlike you."

"Frank, get her out of here. Take her to the lab. I'm right behind you."

* * *

Calleigh was standing at the front door of the lab when Frank came walking up with Kayla. She smiled at the young woman and said, "You must be Kayla. I'm Calleigh. I have someone that will be happy to see you," and stuck out her hand for Kayla to take it

Frank stood there as Horatio's Hummer pulled up with Ms. DeForest inside. He waited for Horatio to escort her to him .

"Frank, take Ms. DeForest inside and charge her with murder and kidnapping," Horatio said. "Also, give these men's clothes to Eric for processing."

"With pleasure. Come with me," Frank demanded to Ms. DeForest.

As he walked her inside, Calleigh walked Kayla to the room where Natalia sat with Chelsea. Chelsea looked up and saw Kayla at the same time Kayla saw her.

"KAYLA !" Chelsea yelled and ran to the door and opened it.

"CHELSEA!" Kayla returned and kneeled with open arms to engulf her.

"Calleigh found you! I'm happy now! I knew she would!"

Calleigh smiled and took the credit, but she knew she had Frank to thank for that. He would forgive her later.

Kayla looked at Calleigh and said, "I can't go back to my house. What my mom did to me was... was..."

"You don't have to say it Kayla. I understand."

"What she has done to Chelsea is even worse. Calleigh, what's going to happen to Chelsea?"

"Well, the social worker tried to locate next of kin."

"There isn't any. It was just them. Right now, I'm the only family Chelsea has. I know being only sixteen, they won't let me be on my own, but we need to stay together. Can you make that happen, Calleigh?"

"I'll see what I can do. I am sure something can be worked out."

"Thank you," Kayla said and hugged Chelsea again.

Calleigh turned to Natalia and wondered if she promised something she should not have.

"I'll go talk to the social worker Calleigh. I sure something can be done to keep them together."

Calleigh smiled then looked in the room where Kayla sat holding Chelsea. Natalia walked off to see what she could get out of the social worker.

Calleigh could only hope.

* * *

Calleigh stood on the sidewalk of the lab and watched. Horatio came up behind her. She turned and saw his sly smile.

"You did we'll Calleigh. Being a mother suits you."

"Yeah Horatio," Calleigh began as she watched Kayla and Chelsea get in the backseat of the car to take them to their new home. "It definitely has its good points. Like now, even though they don't belong to me."

"Oh but Calleigh, they did for a little while," Horatio said and squeezed her shoulder.

Calleigh smiled as the little hand waved goodbye to her as the car drove off.

It felt good to be mother Calleigh thought to herself and could not wait to get home to her children.


End file.
